“MAY SHE GO WITH ME?”
Of course she went. And, of course, now that the truth was known,
much was done. Dr. Everett was summoned. The wretched bed, with its
distressing rags, were turned out together, and a comfortable one took
its place. Broths and teas and jellies and physical comfort of every
kind were furnished, and the doctor did his best to battle with the
disease that long years of want and misery had fastened upon their
victim. It was all too late, of course. It was true, what Mr. Roberts
sadly said, that half of the effort, expended years or even months
before, might have saved the poor, tortured life; but now!
How awful those “too lates” are! Isn't it a wonder that we ever take the
risk of having one ring in our ears forever? There was one thing over
which some of these Christian workers shed tears of joy.
“_I_ am too late,” said Dr. Everett, “but my Master has as much power
to-day as ever. He can save her.”
And He did. The poor, tired woman, who years before had remembered an
old story well enough to name her one daughter “Martha,” in memory of
the one who “loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus,” roused her dull
heart at the mention of His name, and listened while the wonderful story
was told her that He loved not only Martha and her sister, but her own
poor, sinful, wrecked self; loved her enough to reach after her, and
call and wait, and prepare for her a home in His glory.
Dear! Why has not some one come with the news before? Surely she would
have listened during these long, sad years. Well, they made the way
plain. Neither was it a difficult thing to do. The woman was weary and
travel-stained and afraid, and longed for nothing so much as a place of
refuge. She knew that she was a sinner; she knew that she was, and had
been for many a year, powerless to help herself. Why should she not hail
with joy the story of a great and willing Helper?
“Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden.” She opened her
eyes with a gleam of eagerness to hear the words. “Weary?”' Yes, indeed!
“Heavy laden?” Who more so? If the call was not for her, whom _could_ it
mean? What else? Why, what, but the glorious old story, “I will give you
rest?” What wonder that she closed her eyes and smiled! What wonder that
the first words after that were: “I'll come; show me how.” And He showed
her how.
“Dirk,” the sister said, when the mother had gone the last and only
restful journey of her life, “Dirk, _she_ went to heaven; and I'm going.
I've been wanting to tell you for more than a week, but I didn't know
how. _He_ asked me to, and I'm going. Now _you_ must. 'Cause we never
had a good time here, and she'll kind of expect it in heaven, and be
looking out for you; she always looked out for you, Dirk.”
Then did Dirk lose his half-sullen self-control, and great tears rolled
down his dark cheeks.
But the sister shed no tears. She had serious business to attend to.
Dirk must go to heaven now without fail.
* * * * *
One day there was an unusual scene in the alley. It was no uncommon
thing to see a coffin carried out from there, but on this day there was
a hearse, and a minister in Dr. Everett's carriage, and Dirk and his
sister, in neat apparel, came out together and were seated in Mr.
Roberts' carriage; and all the boys of the Monday-evening Class walked
arm in arm after the slow-moving carriages; and the children of the
alley stopped their placing and their fighting, and the women stood
silent in doorways, and took, most of them, their very first lesson in
the proprieties of life.
“She's got a ride in a carriage at last, poor soul!” said one, thinking
of the worn-out body in the coffin; and another said: “I wonder what
poor old Jock would think of all this?”
But the scene made its impression, and left its lesson. I think the
voices of some of them were lower during the rest of the day because of
it.
What next? It was the question that filled Mrs. Roberts' thoughts.
Something must be done for Dirk and Mart. That fearful alley was no
place for human beings; certainly not for these two. But what to do with
them was a question not easily answered.
Various plans were proposed. Sallie Calkins' two rooms were much better
than the cellar in which the Colson family had lived; and there was a
chance to rent a room next to Sallie's, with a closet opening from it
for Dirk. How would it do to have them board with Sallie? The suggestion
came first from Gracie Dennis, and sounded reasonable. Mrs. Roberts was
almost ashamed to dislike it as much as she did. Sallie's neat rooms
were _home_ now. The father, for this length of time at least, held to
his pledge; and son and daughter were radiant over him. He had gone to
work, and already the two rooms were taking on an air of greater comfort
because of the little things that he proudly brought home.
Sallie was doing her part wisely. The table was regularly laid now, with
a white cloth and knives and forks; and two new cups and plates had been
added to the dishes. Would it be wise to invade this home just at this
juncture and introduce boarders? Mrs. Roberts did not believe that it
would. It was not as though the father had an established character,
and stood ready to shield his children; they were still acting the
protective, and he had but too recently risen from the depths where Dirk
and Mart had laughed and jeered at him. Besides, the rooms were located
in that dreadful alley; and, do what she would, Mrs. Roberts could
not feel that that dangerously-beautiful face could find a safe
abiding-place in that alley. Some other way must be thought of.
Their immediate future was arranged through the intervention of a house
agent; for even that dreary and desolate cellar had its agent, who was
eager to secure his rent. He was unwise enough to undertake to interview
Mrs. Roberts as she descended from her carriage, not long after it had
followed Mart's mother to the grave.
He considered this effort of his a special stroke of business energy.
He wanted to be patient with the poor, he said; there wasn't an agent
in the city who waited for them oftener than he did; but business was
business, and it stood to reason that he could not depend on a fellow
like Dirk. It had been bad enough when the mother was there, but
he couldn't think of such a thing as risking it now. What was he to
understand? Did she mean to rent the room for them, and for how long?
Because it was his duty to look out for the future.
What would be more natural than for Mrs. Roberts, with those two young
things looking on, to say that of course she would be responsible for
the rent as long as they lived in the room? Thus reasoned the house
agent.
Instead of which, Mrs. Roberts turned toward Dirk, her face flushed over
the hardness of a man who could stop a boy and girl on such business on
their way from their mother's grave, and said:--
“If I were in your place, Mr. Colson, I should not rent these rooms at
all. They are not suited to your sister's needs. I am sure you can do
better.”
The agent was disgusted. “_Mr._ Colson,” indeed! The disreputable young
scamp whom nobody trusted. He would show this silly woman a fact or two.
“Business is business” he repeated, doggedly. “Either they must take
the room, and pay the rent in advance, or else they must hustle out this
very night.” He had waited now three days after time for decency's sake,
and more than that he couldn't and wouldn't do.
Dirk stood looking from one to the other; the red coming and going on
his swarthy face. Here was responsibility! He had not thought of it
before. The mother was not there to count out the hoarded rent with
trembling fingers, and save the wretched home to them for another month.
She would never be there again. He had nothing with which to pay rent;
he had nowhere to move. Yet _she_ had called him Mr. Colson, and seemed
to expect him to act for himself and Mart.
It was she who answered the agent, but she spoke to Dirk.
“Very well; I suppose you are quite as willing to leave here to-night as
at any time? If I were you, I would leave immediately. Let your sister
come home with me for the night, and until you have time to make other
arrangements.”
Mr. Roberts had been summoned to a bank meeting, and had sent Ried to
attend his wife. He came forward now, from the carriage where he had
stood waiting, and laid a hand on Dirk's arm.
“And you come home with me to-night, Colson,” he said in a cordial tone,
such as he might have used with any young friend; “then we shall have a
chance to talk things over and make plans.”
“That is nice,” Mrs. Roberts said, quickly, rejoicing in her heart over
Ried's promptness to act. “Then you can get away from this wretched
place at once. Mr. Roberts will see to the removal of your goods,
whatever you need, and the agent can call on him in the morning. That
will be the simplest way to settle it all. May she go with me?”
A slight, caressing movement of a gloved hand on the girl's arm
accompanied this question.
Mart was silent with bewilderment. When had Dirk ever before been asked
what _she_ might do, or might not do? At first she was half inclined
to scorn the suggestion. Then, suddenly, it came to her with a sense
of relief and protection: she was not alone; it was Dirk's business to
think of and care for her. Would he do it?
As for Dirk, no wonder that his face was deeply flushed. New thoughts
were struggling in his heart. _He_ was to decide for Mart; he was
the head of the home now. Mrs. Roberts waited anxiously. She longed
exceedingly to rouse in the boy, who was already grown to the stature of
a man, a sense of responsibility.
A moment more, and he had shaken himself free from the spell which
seemed to bind him.
“We'll do as you say.” He spoke with the air of a man who had assumed
his proper place and taken up his duties. “Mart, you go along with her,
and I'll see about things to-morrow.”
And Mart, for the first time in her life, received and obeyed in silence
a direction from her brother.
Possibly Mrs. Roberts may have been mistaken, but she thought that much
had been accomplished that day.
Yet none of them realized whereunto this thing would grow.
Mrs. Roberts, when she ushered Mart that evening into the pink room
again, and showed her how to manage the hot and cold water, and which
bell to ring if she needed anything, and in every imaginable way treated
her as a guest, whom it was pleasant to serve, had really no plans just
then--no hobby to ride--but simply acted out the dictates of her
heart. You will remember that her Christian life had been always
unconventional. The very fact that during her early girlhood she had
been painfully trammelled by what “they” would say or think, seemed to
have had its influence over her later experiences. Since she had been
made free, she would be free, indeed; that is, with the liberty with
which Christ makes us free. What would please _Him_ she resolved should
be the one thought to which she would give careful attention. Now, it is
perhaps worthy of mention, that this closely following disciple did not
once stop to determine whether it would please Him to give such tender
care to this stray child of His, or whether she would be considered
doing not just the thing, in _His_ eyes, if she entertained her in the
pink room.
About what He could have her do next, she gave much thought. And it was
not for days, or rather weeks, that she caught the possibility of His
meaning that the pink room should really be the girl's own.
It was just this way. The weeks went by, and no plan for settling Mart
comfortably elsewhere met Mrs. Roberts' approval. There was constantly
some excellent reason why the one mentioned would not do.
Meantime they became, she and Gracie Dennis, more and more deeply
interested in Mart. In her wardrobe first. “Wherever she lives she
should have respectable clothing; thus much is easily settled.” So the
matron decreed, and Gracie did not gainsay it. She became absorbed in
preparing it. Such fascinating work! So many things were needed, and
her skin was so delicate, and her eyes so blue, and Gracie's choice of
shades and textures fitted her so precisely. Then, when dressed, simple
though her toilet was, her remarkable beauty shone out so conspicuously
as to alarm Mrs. Roberts whenever she thought of her in shop or store.
Several times during the weeks, she visited Sallie Calkins, and looked
about her with a thoughtful air, and came away feeling that it would
not do. There was Mark, growing into manhood, a good boy, hard-working,
respectable, proud of his good, homely sister, and of his reformed
father. The two rooms were taking on every sort of homely comfort that
Sallie's skill, helped by Mrs. Roberts' suggestions, could devise. It
was growing into a model little home in its way, but there was not a
corner in it where Mart would fit.
Then, as the days passed, a subtle, fascinating change began to come
over Mart. She slipped quietly into certain household duties. She showed
marvellous skill with her needle; such skill, indeed, that Gracie Dennis
said more than once: “I'll tell you, Flossy, what to do with her: put
her in a good establishment, and let her learn the dressmaking trade.
She could make her fortune in time.” And Mrs. Roberts smiled, and
assented to the statement, but not to the proposition. There was no
dressmaking establishment known to her where she was willing to place
so young and pretty and ignorant a girl. But she was quite willing that
Mart should learn the looping of dresses, and the fitting of sacks and
collars and ruffles; and take many a stitch for her, as well as for
Gracie. She was willing to have her do a dozen little nameless things,
the ways of doing which she had caught up; until at last the touch of
her fingers began to be felt about the rooms, and Mrs. Roberts began
to notice that she should miss Mart when she went away. Still, from the
first time she said this, the thought came afterward with a smile of
satisfaction, and it was but a week afterward that she caught herself
phrasing it, that she should miss her _if_ she went away.
What about Dirk? Young Ried could have told you more of him during these
days than anybody else. He still stayed at the boarding-house. Mrs.
Saunders, the mistress of it, was one whom, if you had known her, you
would feel sure could interest herself heartily in such as he. There
was a bit of a room next to Ried's. To be sure, it had been used for a
clothes-press, and it took the busy housekeeper half a day to plan how
she could get along without it; but she planned, and offered it to Ried
for his _protégé_.
“Just for the present, you know, until he sees what he can do, poor
fellow,” she said, and Ried accepted the little room joyfully, and
helped fit it up.